Tuesday, May 10, 2022

Finding the RAINBOW in art

This mini lesson is total eye candy. Sit back and enjoy basking in the glow of the RAINBOW.

Let's look at the RAINBOW in art!

Yayoi Kusama: Life Is the Heart of a Rainbow

Starting with Glass artist Dale Chihuly who along with his glass blowing team of artists spins RAINBOW colored glass into multi-color glass works of art

A boat filled with spheres of color or a twisted glass chandelier

Rainbows of thousands of shredded paper strips create this art by Travis Rice.

Sol Lewitt was an American artist whose color filled spaces might stop you in your tracks

Stripes of color carefully drawn and painted on a wall

A RAINBOW of Sol Lewitt's colors may greet you as you enter a New York City subway station. A burst of color in a typically gloomy underground.

An Alabama community of quilters has transformed Colorful bed coverings into works of art.

A group of Gee's Bend quilters create a RAINBOW in stitched scraps of fabric to make these colorful quilts.

In Taiwan an entire village is covered in a spectrum of colors

The buildings in this Taiwan village become works of art right down to the ground.

Why would an artist fill the walls of a building with color?

Well, over 10 years ago, the village where a then-86-year-old Huang Yung-fu lived faced being knocked down. He did not want to leave the only home he had known in Taiwan. Painting his village made people want to visit this location and residents to stay

Gabriel Dawes brings us RAINBOW art that is hanging by a thread

Strand by RAINBOW strand

Literally miles of threads create RAINBOW installations

Across a space, back and forth, slow and steady Gabriel strings delicate threads between secured hooks

A peak inside the process of Gabriel Dawes

Almas Thomas was a retired school teacher and artist. You made art in her style in Kindergarten

Alma would look out her window panes and see specks of color from the flowers in her backyard garden.

She wanted her paintings to look like the rainbow she would view out her window. Dashes of color mimmic the squares of glass in a window.

A group of artists painted their art with intense and saturated colors that we don't typically see in nature.

Because of the colors these artists used, they were called the Fauves --which in French translates to Wild Beast. People were not used to brightly colored art at this time. It was unusual. Sometimes people might not be kind when they don't understand or see something new. How do you respond to things you aren't used to.

Fauvism was a style of painting in the early 1900s (over 100 years ago) that emphasized bright, expressive color

Maurice Vlaminck, Bougival, 1905,

In this LANDSCAPE Do you see PINK, Blue, Read and Teal t

small towns and landscapes with intense color, thick paint, very similar to van Gogh’s style.

Color by number! Artist Emmanuelle Moureaux used brightly colored paper to create a interactive paper installation titled Forest of Numbers

Our St. Louis Art Museum has several colorful works of art

Art by Elsworth Kelly and Frank Stella are a great place to start on your St. Louis Art Museum Rainbow hunt

The Shape of Abstraction by Stanley Whitney is another great stop on the search for color packed art at the SLAM.

Do you respond to color in art?

Will you use more than one color in your art?

What are some of the colors that can make you feel emotions when you look at art?

Jen Stark Chromatic Cascade

Monday, August 23, 2021

Dot

Coming up is International Dot Day. September 15th -ish

Many of you are familiar with Peter Reynolds' book, The Dot. Think about the message in The Dot, why would a Dot have its own day?

International Dot Day takes place to Celebrate Creativity,

Courage & Collaboration!

Imagine the power and potential of millions of people around the world connecting, collaborating, creating and celebrating all that creativity inspires and invites. Today you will be using your talents, gifts and energy to move the world to a better place, you will MAKE YOUR MARK!

Before we get started, Let's look at some artists that used Dots to "make their mark".

Yayoi Kusama is one of the world’s most influential artists with endless energy for creation with colors, patterns, art installation and love for fashion.Since the age of ten, she has been obsessed with polka dots, at first covering her drawings, then later canvases, walls, household objects and even her assistants in them.Known for her iconic dots, pumpkins and infinity rooms, her art has captivated millions all over the world

Yayoi Kusama "Love Is Calling"

Some artists use large dots and some go small....like George Seurat and other artists that use the technique we call Pointillism. When an artist paints with dots of paint rather than long brushstrokes of paint we call this Pointillism. Dots of color side by side visually mix as you view the art

Parade de cirque

Detail from Seurat's Parade de cirque, 1889, showing the contrasting dots of paint which define Pointillism

Vassily Kandinsky filled his art with shapes. Vassily has many paintings filled with circles. A circle is really just a big dot!

wassily kandinsky circles in a circle 1923

Vassily Kandinsky, 1926 - Several Circles

Let's look at a few more...

Almas Thomas painted colorful circles filled with bold colors inspired by the hues in her garden. I see a dot. Do you?

Alma Thomas, The Eclipse, 1970

Alma Thomas, Springtime in Washington, 1971

Lunar Rendezvous—Circle of Flowers Alma Thomas 1969

Roy Lichtenstein created works in the style of comic books. His images are filled with dots of color like the ink of printed comics

Roy Lichtenstein, Crying Girl

Roy Lichtenstein was famous for his bright and bold paintings of comic strip cartoons as well as his paintings of everyday objects. He was one of a group of artists making art in the 1960s who were called pop artists because they made art about 'popular' things such as TV, celebrities, fast food, pop music and cartoons.

Explosion 1965–6

Roy wanted his paintings to look like they were printed rather than hand-painted and he used a newspaper process invented by Benjamin Day, an American illustrator, of printing shades of color with tiny dots, Ben-Day dots.

Howardena Pindell (April 14, 1943) is an abstract artist from Philadelphia, PA. After studying painting in college, she worked at the Museum of Modern Art, and currently teaches at the State University of New York.

Howardena Pindell, Untitled 6F, 2008-9, mixed media on paper collage

Howardena is best known for her abstract collages made of layered paper dots. To create her collages she uses a process known as destruction/reconstruction. What do you think this means?